


Love and Hate

by ravenclawkohai



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: M/M, Puppet Cloud Strife
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-27
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-10-11 13:26:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10466064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravenclawkohai/pseuds/ravenclawkohai
Summary: Puppet!Cloud SefikuraPrompt: "I hate you, but I think I hate myself more."





	

               Since Tifa had pulled him out of the Lifestream and pushed the pieces of him back together, he realized that, if he knew nothing else at all, it was that he knew very little. After everything, his memory was left a patch-work, bits and pieces strung together with little but single threads holding it all together. His childhood in Nibelheim was mostly there, but there were gaps, sometimes of months, other times of years. Almost the entirety of his time at Shinra was gone; he remembered failing the SOLDIER exam and he remembered the Nibelheim mission, but everything else was wholly absent. No one could _really_ expect him to remember all of the time in the labs. He was in and out of consciousness, in and out of a dissociative state, not to mention the memories his mind suppressed purely for damage control, to ensure that there was some scraps of him left to hold the rest together. He didn’t even remember his time with AVALANCHE clearly. He caught bits of exploding reactors, glaring lights from cities and the Gold Saucer, landscapes from widely-scattered patches of land. He had been told about the times he would all but pass out, holding his head and collapsing in pain, but there were still too many holes for that to be it.

               His friends knew the state of his memory, were patient with reminding him of information he should have known but no longer did. They understood, were compassionate (even the most brusque of the bunch), and honestly went out of their way to help him in any way they could. They still looked to him for leadership, but they knew enough to make sure he had all the relevant information before making any decisions.

               What he would not tell his friends about was the pattern his lingering memories took. It seemed like every moment tied to Sephiroth was crystal clear, truly the only memories that were entirely whole. He could recall with perfect clarity the words Sephiroth had spilled into his mind from so far away, down to the tone and cadence. He remembered the overwhelming feeling of his will pressing down on Cloud’s own, being caught like a man at sea in a storm, helpless among towering waves that crashed one after the other, never giving him a chance to breathe. He remembered fighting, gods, he had fought. But he also remembered every time it came to nothing. When Aeris had died in spite of his efforts. When he’d led AVALANCHE according to little cues Sephiroth had planted into his thoughts. When he handed over the Black Materia. _Those_ things he remembered so well that they were haunting. And truly, he couldn’t say if the bigger problem was that clarity or the way the memories haunted him.

               He didn’t know which of the two was the cause, or perhaps if it was a combination, but the result was the sticky way his mind seemed permanently trained on Sephiroth. He tried to write it off as sensible focus on one’s enemy in order to catch them. He pretended that it was his attempts to think like Sephiroth to outsmart him. Really, it was more the remaining effects of Sephiroth’s control. The man lingered in his mind like spider webs, catching any thought that came too close and refusing to let go. His thoughts turned again and again to Sephiroth, to the emotions the man raised in him, to the sheer body feeling of fighting his control and even the feeling of losing, to the way he almost missed his soft voice filling the corners of his mind, leaving him bereft and strangely lonely in his own head.

               Luckily, he was able to pretend with relative success that his mind hadn’t latched (almost desperately) onto Sephiroth. No one knew, so no one was alarmed, or concerned, or frightful. But because no one knew, no one was able to help.

               Sephiroth’s hold on Cloud had been broken, thanks to the Lifestream, thanks to Tifa. But he remained so far in Cloud’s head that it was almost as if he hadn’t left at all.

               Cloud found himself unconsciously imagining what thoughts Sephiroth would pass to him in different situations, what he would try to force Cloud to do, how he would have attempted to guide Cloud while making it seem like the blond’s own original thoughts and decisions. His mind produced echoes of those effects before Cloud even knew what was happening, leaving him incapable of fighting it. Though the overbearing will was absent, the distracting hum in his thoughts, the dozen dizzying ways the real Sephiroth had ensnared Cloud all missing. His mind produced words that matched what Sephiroth would say with uncanny ease. He could imagine that drowning feeling of how Sephiroth _would_ try to take control from Cloud in different situations. But it all felt hollow, without Sephiroth’s overwhelming presence there to give it substance.

               Cloud had been aware of the situation. What he wasn’t aware of was when it grew out of control. Somewhere along the line, those Sephiroth-impressions stopped sounding so much like the man himself and began to sound more like Cloud’s own thoughts. It had started small, with little conflicting thoughts. He began to need to wrestle with every decision, one train of thought pulling one way, the other the opposite. At first, he had known that one of those paths was ridiculous, counter-productive, and sometimes downright harmful. But, over time, he began to lose track over which track was which. The pseudo-Sephiroth thoughts began to feel more natural than his own. More than once, AVALANCHE members had looked at him in confusion, glancing between themselves, before eventually deciding to follow his lead.

               The more he began to think like Sephiroth, the wider the gate he created into his own psyche. Tifa had helped him build a wall to shut the man out, but each little thought, every small decision and impulse chipped away at it. It hadn’t taken Sephiroth long to find that gap and dig his fingers in, wrenching it wider as the days went. Cloud became totally lost in his own thoughts, unsure of what was him, what was the false Sephiroth his mind had conjured, and what was the man himself.

               Sephiroth had learned his lesson the first time. Pressing too hard forced physical reactions, and nothing would alert AVALANCHE quicker to his presence than Cloud falling to his knees again, clutching his shaking head. He found he didn’t have to do much work at all to guide Cloud, only needing slight, gentle little tugs on the reins. He waited patiently for the right moment before truly taking control and making Cloud realize just how far down inside his mind Sephiroth had clawed.

               Though AVALANCHE had begun to quietly question his decisions, when he led them right into the Ultima WEAPON, they had little choice but to fight. In fact, they had such little control over the situation in their desperation to survive that they didn’t even notice until the battle was done that Cloud had disappeared entirely.

               Even Cloud had little idea of what he was doing. His mind had become a maze, scattered with different paths laid by himself, pseudo-Sephiroth, and Sephiroth himself. He was helplessly lost, and in his desperation to make sense of his own mind, he left his body beyond vulnerable. When he came to, he was in a frozen wasteland, sitting across a bonfire from Sephiroth, who watched him with interest. He grinned, the expression fully predatory, as Cloud resurfaced.

               “Where I am?” Cloud asked. It was a testament to how disoriented he was that it was his first question.

               “The Northern Crater,” Sephiroth provided readily.

               “How did I get here?” he asked, pressing the heel of his hand to his temple—gods,  his head was throbbing, so damn much that it was making it difficult to see straight.

               “You walked,” Sephiroth answered, eyes following Cloud’s every movement with calculated interest.

               “Walked?” Cloud said, finally looking up at him.

               “Yes.” It was all Sephiroth offered. Cloud peered at his surroundings, but saw little more than ice and snow from the little circle of light their fire provided.

               “I don’t remember what happened,” he said, looking back to Sephiroth, who cocked his head, looking at him curiously.

               “Does that surprise you?” he asked, voice holding a strange tone that Cloud couldn’t identify as either polite or mocking. Regardless, it was almost enough to earn an outright wince.

               “No,” Cloud mumbled. “I guess not.”

               “To refresh your memory,” Sephiroth offered, sounding like he was doing Cloud a favor; and maybe he was, “you led your party to fight the Ultima WEAPON, then abandoned them.”

               Cloud looked up at him in sheer horror.

               “I didn’t,” he protested. “I would never.”

               That smile spread across Sephiroth’s face again.

               “You did,” he assured.

               Cloud opened his mouth to argue further, but his ears began to ring, his head filling with familiar white noise, Sephiroth’s presence crushing him inside his mind in an outright show of force Cloud had nearly forgotten.  When he was given a reprieve, he realized he had fallen to his knees in the snow, his hands clutching at his head again. He looked up, and Sephiroth’s expression was almost fond.

               “Are you sure you wouldn’t do that to them?” he asked, voice cloying and deep, yet almost sickeningly sweet in its mocking.

               “I—” Cloud started, then faltered. He had been thinking so clearly, but suddenly, the cacophony rose in his head again, and he was dropped back into the maze, again unable to sort out what his own thoughts were. He struggled internally, fought desperately, and eventually decided to follow the path that, at his best guess, was his own thoughts.

               He chose wrong. It wasn’t Sephiroth’s own voice he followed, but the clone his subconscious had created; it had done so with a terribly eerie accuracy.

               Having settled to follow his chosen train of thought, he clung to it, despite the way his own thoughts would sometimes attempt to pull him into following his own will once more. His stubbornness was proving to be his downfall; he had made a decision, and he was sticking to it. He could not be swayed.

               Over the days and weeks that followed, Cloud spoke little; there was simply no need. His mind followed Sephiroth’s own thoughts so well that he was able to nearly predict what the man wanted or needed, moving to act without needing to be told.

               Sephiroth found it fascinating, and nearly endearing. But, as he had been since Nibelheim, Sephiroth found himself insatiable. Cloud had become the perfect puppet, but now that Sephiroth had him, he found it wasn’t enough. He missed the little things that made Cloud himself; his stubbornness, his resourcefulness, his loyalty, his trust, his brokenness, his hurt, the little fire that Cloud kept in his heart that burned so, so bright at times.

                And so, he set back to work. Cloud had let his pseudo-Sephiroth take over him in just the same way he had let his Zack-persona take control before his dip in the Lifestream. Just as Tifa tore his false-Zack from him, Sephiroth peeled back the clone Cloud had created of him. He was not as blunt as Tifa was; he knew the state it had left Cloud in, knew full well that the Lifestream wasn’t all that had incapacitated the blond. He worked slowly, with finesse, guiding Cloud back to himself, rebuilding what he missed and leaving what he didn’t want. Cloud had recreated himself in Sephiroth’s image, turning himself into the perfect puppet. Sephiroth didn’t need a second version of himself, someone to mimic him, serving as little more than a second set of hands. What he needed—what he _wanted_ was a partner.

               He wanted Cloud (he had _always_ wanted Cloud, ever since the reactor), and he would have him—he would have him exactly the way Sephiroth wanted him. Like a sculptor, Sephiroth molded Cloud back into himself, but chipped off the excess, the qualities that he didn’t want, the beliefs Cloud no longer needed, the memories that now served no purpose.

               What was left was undeniably Cloud, but a compliant variant. He believed whole-heartedly in Sephiroth and his cause. He knew the ex-general to be a god. He threw himself into Sephiroth’s cause with everything he had to offer, just as Cloud had always been wont to do; never doing things by halves. He was still a spitfire. He was still passionate underneath all that hesitance and awkwardness. He still cared with the whole of him (though what he cared about was so, so different). Sephiroth walled off all unnecessary memories, giving Cloud no access to his time in Nibelheim, in Shinra, with AVALANCHE. All he remembered was that AVALANCHE opposed Sephiroth, and that Sephiroth’s goals were his own.

               Truly, it hadn’t even been Sephiroth that made the first move; it had been Cloud. It had been after a fight with local monsters when Cloud came up behind him and took his hand, touch strangely gentle. Sephiroth had looked back, expecting there to be a problem of some sort. He hadn’t expected Cloud to reach up (still so gentle), cup the back of his head, and pull him down. He pressed their lips together so lightly, just a bare brush, making it almost feel ticklish. Sephiroth could remember distinctly the way Cloud had blinked in shock at his own actions, immediately pulling back, a blush on his cheeks and an apology on his lips.

               Sephiroth had looked at him, considering. This wasn’t something he had thought of before, not an option that had crossed his mind. He had wanted Cloud with a possessive, jealous need. Had he wanted him in more ways than one? It had only taken a moment to mull over, and he moved before Cloud had even finished saying he was sorry.

               He slid his fingers down Cloud’s jaw, tilting it up; the touch completely stilled him. Sephiroth pressed their lips together, firmly but briefly. He pulled back and inspected Cloud’s face, watched him blink slowly, dazed, that rosy blush still high on his cheeks, still leaning forward. When he looked back up at Sephiroth, his eyes were half-lidded. The picture he made sent a spiral of warmth through Sephiroth’s stomach, and he made his decision quickly. Both hands rose to frame Cloud’s face, holding him firmly in place as he kissed him again; slower this time, more exploratory, taking in every inch of his mouth and every gasp of his breath. At some point, Cloud had locked his arms around Sephiroth’s neck to hold him near, and Sephiroth’s hands dipped for further exploration.

               He found that he was extremely fond of the way Cloud looked when he was kissed breathless.

               He was even fonder of how he looked fucked senseless, a picture of innocence thoroughly debauched.

               Sephiroth’s touches had been limited to guiding hands on his shoulder and restraining grips on his wrist. There came to be no part of Cloud he _hadn’t_ touched, and he found his fingers lingering in useless, but thoroughly enjoyable, touches. Fingers through his hair, a hand low on his back, taking his hand to pull him along, casual gropes, and so, so many kisses. Sephiroth found himself indulging every time the whim passed, and Cloud never once protested—rather, he was very encouraging. As in most things, Cloud let himself be led, content to follow Sephiroth’s lead. He asked for very little, but he gave Sephiroth a _look_ that was all fire and passion and need. He learned how to outright beg with his gaze, never taking anything for himself, but desperately asking permission. It was another look of Cloud’s that Sephiroth was very, very fond of.

               In the end, it came to a cocky gesture, caused by curiosity but followed through by self-assurance. It had come to the end of things, Meteor hanging low in the sky, the final battle won. AVALANCHE lie dead at their feet, Cloud having dealt the final blow to Tifa, who had been the last standing. Though Sephiroth had long since stopped counting AVALANCHE as a true threat, the sweet swell of victory passed through him. He planted Masamune in the dirt and crossed to Cloud in swift, long strides. He swept Cloud into his arms, and the blond had come to him with a glowing beam and a bright laugh. They kissed, long and hard and sweet, pulling apart time and again for breath, the length of their kisses tapering off to brief touches before leaning away. Cloud gave him that winning smile again, and a small mirror of it grew on Sephiroth’s face. Cloud leaned up to press their foreheads together, sharing breath as they shared smiles.

               Once the thought had crossed his mind, though, Sephiroth found he couldn’t banish it. He pulled away again, caressing Cloud’s face.

               “I wonder…” he breathed. Cloud cocked his head in askance, but Sephiroth offered no answers.

               He had Cloud exactly as he wanted him, but he couldn’t deny the curiosity of how the _real_ Cloud would react. He had cut off the unwanted bits of him, but he hadn’t been able to destroy them; they remained, locked in the deep recesses of his mind. It would be a simple matter to pull them back out to satisfy his curiosity, an even simpler matter to sweep them away again when he was done. He pressed his forehead against Cloud’s again and slowly, carefully, undid his work, making Cloud whole again.

               When the pieces settled into place, Cloud came back to himself with a sharp gasp. Sephiroth let him go when he stumbled back out of his touch. The panic was clear on his face; he had no idea where he was, had no recollection of the months he had spent at Sephiroth’s side.

               It was Meteor he saw first, and Sephiroth watched with calm interest as the blood rushed from his face.

               “No,” he had said, voice a small, broken little thing. Though Sephiroth loved the Cloud he had built, _his_ Cloud, he found he did miss the original’s brokenness and pain. A shiver of cruel delight passed through him.

               It only grew as Cloud forced his eyes away from the glowing red sky to look at his surroundings. Strangely, Sephiroth had again become an afterthought. Cloud first caught sight of the bodies of his friends, caught sight of his bloodied sword still held loosely in his grip. He dropped the blade as if it had scalded him and, with a look of sheer horror, touched a patch of sticky blood that was cooling on his face. He could feel no cut of his own there, _knew_ where the blood had come from, and it had been too much for him.

               Cloud doubled over, tossing up the contents of his stomach. He sank to his knees with sickness and continued and continued long passed the point where his stomach was empty, dry heaving again and again. When Cloud sank back to his heels, it was with a haunted look on his face and tears in his eyes. He turned his eyes back up to Meteor, tear-tracks staining his face. He had still yet to notice Sephiroth.

               Sephiroth came forward, carefully avoiding the sick, and knelt before Cloud. He turned Cloud’s face toward him with a gentle touch, a cold curiosity on his face. Cloud jerked back from his touch, scrambled back.

               “You!” he gasped, full of accusation, full of hate. A smile bloomed on Sephiroth’s face as he shook his head.

               “No,” he corrected, “ _us_.”

               It took Cloud a moment to catch his meaning, to accept the confirmation of his own part in the death of his friends.

               Sephiroth stood and crossed to Cloud’s side, despite the way the blond scrabbled away from him. As he knelt, he took Cloud’s chin in his grip, partially to get a good long look, partially to see the way he tried to jerk back in horror.

               A second curiosity passed through him and he tilted his head. He was being self-indulgent in light of his victory; no harm in indulging a little further. He dug into Cloud’s head again, rearranging pieces, connecting parts he had pulled apart before. Horror grew and grew on Cloud’s face as Sephiroth returned his memory of his betrayal of AVALANCHE, of the months spent at his side.

               For a second, Cloud looked ill again, and Sephiroth nearly pulled back to dodge it, but there was no need. If he had looked broken before, he was _shattered_ now. He didn’t move an inch as Sephiroth caressed his face, head tilted to one side with interest, hair spilling over his shoulder. The tears came quick and ready, growing quicker and quicker, until Cloud’s shoulder shook with the effort of it.

               It was his worst nightmare come true.

               Cloud was revolted, sure. Infuriated, absolutely. So, so very hurt, his heart aching so hard it seemed it would split. It was _worse_ than his worst nightmare. Ever since he handed over the Black Materia, the fear of betraying his friends had seeped into his very bones. The thought of Sephiroth’s hands on him was salt in the wound, insult to injury, but what struck to the heart of him was the terribly clear memory of how much he _loved_ Sephiroth. Every part of him loved the man so much, the feeling so embedded in him, that he could still feel it, in spite of the pain it caused. This man had taken everything from him, from everyone he loved, had maimed his mind, torn his heart to shreds, and yet, _and yet_. Cloud had always been one to feel things deeply, but he had never known an emotion so intense as his love for Sephiroth. Nothing he thought or did could shake it. He found that, though he knew it would wreck him, he would still do anything for this man. He would let him take and take until he had nothing left and still beg for attention, affection.  

               Sephiroth, who was so entwined in Cloud’s mind, knew the way the love lingered despite Cloud’s best efforts, the way he still adored him in spite of everything. A smile grew on Sephiroth’s face.

               He loved the Cloud he had built and molded to his exact specifications, to meet his every want and need.

               He found he also loved the original, the Cloud he had taken and broken, who he had wound around his finger so, so tight, who still loved with the whole of him, despite the way it was splintered.

               “You truly are mine, aren’t you?” Sephiroth asked, voice a soft, wondering thing as his eyes passed over Cloud’s face, taking in every inch of him.

               “I hate you,” Cloud hissed, and they both knew that to be true as well. The smile Sephiroth gave him was fond and indulgent.

               “You do,” he agreed.

               “I hate you,” he insisted, but his voice warped, turned quiet, “but I think I hate myself more.”

               Sephiroth had never been more fascinated in his life.

               He had long since decided to take Cloud with him when he rode the husk of the planet to see the stars, and suddenly, he was very glad for it. The journey would give him all the time he needed and more, to take in every aspect of both his created Cloud and the original, to savor life with each, to bask in that love, whether it was the sweet, worshipful love his creation or the bitter, broken love of the first.

 


End file.
